HEATHROW
 

The following link is to the Guardian on line and concerns the Govt's appeal against the recent decision. It would appear that various departments could be battling against oneanother. Stormy times for Tony !<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0%2C3604%2C628822%2C00.html" target="_blank">Guardian on line</a> <img src="smile.gif" border="0">

LHR Terminal 2 / Heathrow East
 

Just seen following on Yahoo - apologies if posted elsewhere:

A £1.5 billion plan to demolish Terminal 2 at Heathrow airport and build a new terminal in time for the 2012 Olympics has been outlined by airport operator BAA.
Work on the new terminal could start by 2009 and the terminal would be capable of handling 30 million passengers a year.
Designed to complement the new £4.2 billion Terminal 5 at Heathrow, the new terminal could be used by Sir Richard Branson's airline Virgin Atlantic as well as by members of the airline group Star Allianincludes British carrier bmi, Lufthansa and Singapore Airlines.
Known as Heathrow East, the BAA plan will be for the demolition of Terminal 2 and the adjacent Queen's Building office block, with the new terminal being built on the site and spreading to the east.
BAA stressed that the plan would not involve any net increase in passenger capacity.
BAA intends to discuss the idea formally with airlines to assess the viability of the project. The plan would also be dependent on regulatory support from the Civil Aviation Authority.
If all goes well, a planning application could be submitted in 2007, permission granted in 2008, work started in 2009 and the terminal completed in time for the 2012 Olympics.
Terminal 5 is due to open in 2008, with British Airways moving its entire operation there. It will be capable of handling more than 30 million passengers a year.
BAA Heathrow managing director Mick Temple said: "The significant increase in capacity created by Terminal 5 gives us a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to look at the rest of Heathrow and think creatively about how we can use our current very limited space better.
"We are excited by the idea of Heathrow East, but at the moment it is still just an idea. We aim to discuss the possibilities with our airlines and the CAA to see if we can make it a reality. Our vision is to create the world's greatest international hub airport in the world's greatest city”

Another piece of history gone.... Yes I know it's God awful but hey! That's progress.

"Heathrow East"
 

So BAA plan to demolish T2 at LHR and replace it:


Press release

and a Picture

Wither T1 and T3?!

Was trawling the net and found this :-

London] Heathrow has been described as the only building site to have its own airport.

— anon.



Brilliant !!!!!

HEATHROW
 

Just read on BBC website
T5 Builders to go on strike re pay

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4487418.stm

G-I-B

BAA and oneworld reach agreement on Heathrow Airport terminal 3
 

The member airlines of the oneworld airline alliance and BAA have signed an agreement which will see the airlines other than BA transfer to Heathrow Airport's Terminal 3 when BA moves in to Terminal 5 in March 2008.

Currently, oneworld carriers - who account for more than 50 percent of Heathrow's traffic with 35 million passengers a year travelling on about 700 departures and arrivals a day - are split across all four of Heathrow's terminals. Under the agreement their operations will be consolidated in an up-graded Terminal 3, which is the closest of the existing terminals to the new Terminal 5. oneworld carriers will share adjacent check-in desks, jetbridges and other facilities in Terminal 3.

BAA Heathrow describes the agreement as a key part of its strategy to co-locate airline alliances. It is currently investing significantly in Terminal 3, the building is undergoing a multi-million pound modernisation program, with a substantial amount planned to be spent on passenger and baggage-related projects during the next seven years.

In addition, the check-in area will be reshaped and expanded to minimise congestion, make it easier for passengers to find their way around and provide more natural light. The latest technology and infrastructure will be incorporated into new baggage systems and other passenger services.

The agreement covers all seven of the existing oneworld member airlines serving Heathrow - British Airways, American Airlines, Qantas, Cathay Pacific Airways, Iberia, Finnair and Aer Lingus. It also makes provision for all three of the carriers currently lining up to join the alliance - Japan Airlines, Malev and Royal Jordanian. The agreement provides for their growth in Terminal 3 as Heathrow's overall capacity expands in the future.

BA will be the only airline housed at the new Terminal 5. The size and shape of its Heathrow schedule in 2008 will mean a small number of its services will be located at Terminal 3. These will include its departures to Australia and Spain, to maximise the cohesion of its joint services with oneworld partners Qantas and Iberia.

source - http://www.uk-airport-news.info/heat...ws-140306a.htm

any word on T4? Is that likely to be Star Alliance partners?

Star at LHR
 

I thought the plan was for Star Alliance to have T1 refurbished, and Sky Team to go into T4.

I've also heard T4 will become Skyteam.
T2 is going to become the balance of the non-alliance airlines I think.

Central area is going to look like a building site until the 2012 Olympics, lets hope they can get it all done in time!

I thought QF were going to T5 with their A380s?

QF have never been going to T5 they were always going to stay in T4 or move to T3. QF Management have no interest in moving there.

LHR has always been a building site and probably always will. I have been in and out of LHR since the late 70's and it has always been a building site. After spending so much on the terminals its a shame the road access is rubbish still, and public transport from anywhere other than towards London is rubbish. (Try getting a bus or train from the south/south west of the airport....)

Only building site in the world with it's own airport......
What's happening with the old control tower, it adds character to the whole place.

Also, I can understand why BA use T1 for the NRT, JNB SFO and LAX services, spare gate capacity at certain times, byt exactly why can they not get a single gate for the MIA services which are in ..... Terminal 3.
Are BOAC homesick ? And so when T5 opens, the OZ services will be in T3 still ?

Skipness

the T3 service is so BA are on the T3 committee IIRC.

Well, if they're going to that, then to make the QF part of that work properly, BA will have to put all BKK, HKG and SIN services in T3 as well.

Othewise, can you imagine the chaos? "BA11 to SIN will operate from T5, but BA15 to SIN will operate from T3 ..." Hordes of paying punters turning up in the wrong place on a regular basis, which will cost BA money to sort out irrespective of who's fault it technically is.

LHR southside chaos again...
 

Come on BAA, can we get this sorted out??
Long long delays around Heathrow south this morning due to massive queues getting into checkpoints.
Buses delayed trucks held up and junctions blocked solid, whats going on?
This happened a couple of months back and here we go again.

Maybe they shouldn't have failed 57 out of 61 tests on security during the recent audit by the DTI (allegedly, of course!).

Well i know at least 15 teststhat didnt get through so the figures that are alleged must be wrong,

Maybe all the staff that go through come prepared and dont take ages empting pockets and stuff, and stop moaning about it.
This would put less pressure on the guards to try which try to
a) keep the airport safe
b) having to try and cater for the whining that they face,

Trying to help speed up and get people through has back fired and they failed test pieces. so this mean in order to save their own job they have to slow down and watch their backsides. if they fail they are out.

Its a bit like the egg and spoon race if you rush you fail!!

If in doubt have it out is a good way of seeing it.

P.s i would agree however that there isnt enough checkpoints / guards.

This is due to the managment not the individual gaurds.!!

Hope everyone gets the idea, and please excuse the spelling mistakes it late.

BAA / HAL need to pull their finger out and sort this pronto - it is their fault that their staff haven't been doing their jobs properly, hence failing the tests, and BA should be offered some pretty large compensation for the grief their incompetence has caused.

These issues also extend into the terminals, causing flight delays due constant pax offloads and really, really winding up OUR passengers. I've lost count of the number of irate passengers turning up at the gate screaming blue murder because they've just spend 2 hours in a security queue, especially if they've now missed their flight depsite arriving at the airport in plenty of time.

The thing that really p****s me off is that they complain that they don't have enough security lanes in the terminal building, yet have acres of revenue generating shops in the same building - I am becoming increasingly hacked off with their poor levels of customer service in the name of cost.

I'm going to stop writing now cos I'm in danger of going off on a real rant..but next time you walk through the lobby area and down a jetty to board your well maintained flight deck, take a minute to look around at the filth that us ground staff have to work in... :):)

I have to tell you that because of this type of phenomenon, I am now planning my overseas trips to minimise air travel and completely avoid LHR.

Hi again, i have to agree on its BAA (the company) that has let them get away with accerating the time it take to check a person, you are right they should have stop them from not doing their job properly, But im afraifd as you well know it saves them alot of money for them to let the guards get away with it.

A) i would say the 2 hour waiting time is a bit much !! more like 45 minutes at the mo everyone tends to times there waiting time by 1.5,

Like how long it takes for a dispatcher to arrive at flights during some parts of the day at Heathrow.

B) Another thing is that there is enough security lanes and its not a thing about space its more to do with not having allocatied enough staff to an area to run all the machines.

use to be 9 machines on INT in T1 with only about 4-6 running!!

Thats the problem not space!!

And the silly thing for BAA is when this Passengers are in the "2 hour" infact only 10-50 minutes the passengers are are not in the shops making them money!! and inturn arriving at the flight ready and in a good mood to by Duty Free!!.

Or yer and that same filth should go in a couple of years when BA getT5

And T2 goes,

It all of the local crap about not wanting a new terminal thats also delayed things.

Think if the Public reviews didnt go on T5 would be open now.

And that rubbish and filth in the terminal we all have to work in it infact some of us have to chase it down the taxiway so it doesnt go in your engines.

Cheers

From personal experience in T4 2 weeks ago I waited in excess of 45 minutes after a BA ground staff member had taken me to the front of the landside queue due only 50 mins to departure. From there it took 45 mins due only 2 machines in operation. I remonstrated with the security Duty manager who had no idea of the length of the queue's landside and agreed that only 2 machines was disgraceful?
Last week all X-ray machines working but not enough walkthrough scanners and queue was 20 minutes.

The BAA obviously has a problem managing their security and should get their finger out now!!!

If this sort of continual mismanagement, delay and incompetent planning were happening anywhere else in the aviation process, like engineering, ops, or whatever, the responsible management would have been taken to task and then removed long ago.

Yet somehow security seem able to get out of it with a cry of "well it's for security so you can't touch me".

Yes, security management. Either do your job and manage the security procedures effectively, up to specification, competently, politely, without delays, and without impacting on the rest of the organisation, or stand aside and let someone who can deliver all of these take over. In the general scale of airline operations it's one of the easier tasks.

T4 yesterday had two machines not operating for some reason. And is it 5 or 6 machines in total? The management of BAA/HAL are obviously totally incompetent in not having fixed this problem, and ought to be fired.

The extra time in the queue is nothing to do with security. It is all to do with the appearance of security. They have to be "seen to be doing something" after failing the checks.

I say this beacuse a Captian I was flying with was refused access airside recently. He was in uniform, and had his ID. When this failed to swipe, he showed his passport and licence - not good enough for the security guard, he had to show a crew manifest. Lucky we had one. Now where on earth does it say we need a crew manifest to get airside? The fact his pass didn't swipe was not the Captain's fault - it was one of the new issue ID's that BAA haven't got working yet.

This whole process took about 10 minutes, while others waited patiently behind. I then went through and the didn't even swipe my pass!!!!!

Simply put, BAA are short of 300 staff. And therein lies the problem. Staff leaving, resigning or retiring out outweighing the recruitment. Apparently it takes 4 months to get a new guard on line with all the checks and training. Also with the current intake of 100, only 70 are left after just 6 weeks. Inside source stated that they only expect 40 to pass final tests and go on to line work.

And for how long have these been typical figures ? Years I suspect. And has anything been done about it ? No.

short of staff... didnt they announce mega redundancies around Christmas time last year? second some managers into these "security roles" to get things moving. Clear the landside road queues for a start, the congestion can be terrible as AllDayDeli says.

I am a regular traveller and can only agree with Sunfish. I travel from my local airport which is Southampton and is efficent and the staff helpful to other European airports were I can then travel long haul. I cannot stand LHR and would rather pay more to fly from somewhere else. Heathrow is a paradise however compared to the terminals at LAX!!!

And to answer. I complained in writing about the length of queues to BAA and the response was as given above re staff shortage, time to recruit, checks and all that.This was in the Autumn of.......2003

Hi,

The thing is that the guards, which wait upto 5 hours before having a break.
The Supervisor which are stuck in the middle between upset passengers / airlines / guards / managers have to try and find the mid point to try and keep everyone happy with the resourse.
The Front line managers all say that theres not enough staff to run the process properly,

Its the upper managers with the budgets that is causing all this the front line staff are just doing it how they think is best for everyone.

The thing about the pilot with a id that doesnt swipe. is lucky he got in that quick. It isnt stand process to allow them in on a manifest.

What would happen if a person turn up with and id that does swipe a fake liance anda dodgy uniform would you let him in?? then everyone would moan about how he shouldnt have been allowed in.

I totally agree with the fact its not acceptable that you have to wait long periods of time but i do think that the frontline staff are doing it the best way. with what they have which is not enough staff. to many empty machines, late breaks. Yes the staff do need a break they are cant go on forever.

So if think having a pop on the low part of the tree level is just making it it worst.

Anyway i wont write anymore.

Cheers

I have an extremely simple cure for this entire problem. It could be implemented in a matter of months, and it is guaranteed to produce a security workforce that is competent, fast, helpful, friendly and efficent


Offer to pay the Security Guards 200,000 pounds a year.

It's always the same problem when you hear the "we can't recruit enough staff" what they really mean is "We can't find competent people who will work for us for the miserable amount we are offering to pay them

To put it another way you get what you pay for

To an outsider , it would appear that it is a work-to rule/go slow practice....
the other sunday morning at 0530 it took us over an hour and a quarter to get through at the entry point by 'Gate Gourmet' roundabout - we got on the a/c 20 mins after take-off.

If they're not being given the resources then fair enough - but with BAA's big profits, surely they do not want every a/c taking off an hour late due to logistics.

This needs sorting out. Fast.

Crikey, that must have taken some doing!!!!!!! :D ;)

BH

If the Airlines started billing them each time a departure was delayed as a direct result of taking ages to get through Security, ie late crews, they would soon speed up!!!!

This is already being attempted, at least by my company.

Hi all,

A couple of replys to some of the comments in the last few emails.

Anti-Ice.good comments and you seem to view it from both angles:-

"If they're not being given the resources then fair enough - but with BAA's big profits, surely they do not want every a/c taking off an hour late due to logistics"

it is a resource problem and the bit about work to rule.

Well its exactly what it is. Thats how it should be!! Unfortunatly the resources in place are for people that dont work to rule.
Which im afraid happened many times to get people through to flights, the guards started to fail the tests and for their own job security which is what really matters to live. They have to do the job how it should be done. I.e work to rule. Which causes queues until BAA managment admit that for the job to be done to the rule book they need more staff. they are getting more staff but from now till then its going to be crap!!


---------------------------------------------------------------

About billing BAA for long queues. This does happen.

The BAA and airlines have agreed a limit to how long queue time can be and if they go over this time more than a fix amount of occasions then they have to pay all the airlines effected a certain amount of money more for the more common airlines based on % of flights.

This is the same of the other hand. when an airline doesnt push back for other reasons they too have to pay up so basically the money goes back and forth, looking at the queses more money is going from BAA to the airlines i would guess.

Not to mention how much BAA is losing from retail when the passengers spend an hour in a queue when they could be spending an hour in the shops.

by cutting the queues everyone could make a lot more money!!
-------------------------------------------------------------------

cheers

If passengers get a wiff if this then perhaps they can bill the airline and the airport for delays too. In the old days it was turn up an hour before a flight, then it was two and now its about four.

It really does prove the old maxim, "time to spare go by air".

Eurostar to Paris really is a much more pleasant way to go.